Gloves for sapphire sieving

[phantom83]

Hi All

I was hoping that someone might be able to recommend a good pair of gloves to use when sieving for sapphires. I recently did some prospecting at Grabben Gullen, and although I had a great time, I was really disappointed with the amount of broken glass that I was finding in my sieve. I kept all the pieces that I came across so that nobody else cuts themselves, but I am sure there is still lots of glass there.

I imagine the perfect pair of gloves would probably need to be designed for working in the wet, but provide enough flexibility to still be able to use a pair of tweezers for picking up the gems.

Any recommendations? Thanks in advance!

Cheers

Pete

 

[Heatho]

G'day Phantom,

It is very dissapointing pulling glass out of there, have found a lot there myself, I'm not sutre if there are gloves that will stop a shard like that except maybe a chain mail butchers glove, they are bloody expensive. I'm just very carefull and sometimes use a trowel to agitate/stir the top sieve untill I can see whats in it.

 

[phantom83]

Hi Heatho - thanks for the reply, and also for the details on Grabben Gullen in response to my last post. I made it there during the week for a few hours and had a bloody brilliant day - pretty successful for my third time sapphire fossicking. I plan to post a short trip report later this evening.

Cheers

Pete

 

[Westaus]

Hi All I am getting a range of gloves in for business, I will see if there is anything in the range that may be useful. As mentioned stopping is very difficult as you want to move and feel, but be protected. I will let you know if I see something of interest. Where possible look for a cut rating on a glove.

Gloves use numbers in a sequence, each number means something, look for the hammer and under that will be numbers. Must get the hammer or it may reference to another standard, such as freezer gloves.

1st number = Abrasion
2nd number = Cut
3rd number = Tear
4th number = Puncture

Examples
(4 2 2 1) will have good abrasive protection but poor puncture
(2 4 4 2) will have good Cut and Tear protection but less abrasive protection or life, such as handling bricks.

Hope that was not too confusing ?

For those that have too much time on their hands (pun, pun) have a look here for a lot more detailed information -https://nationalsafety.wordpress.com/tag/cut-resistance/